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Netflix’s ‘You People’ wasn’t funny at all to my Black and Mexican Jewish family
(JTA) — As a couple that is two parts Jew, one part Black, and all parts lovers of comedy, my husband and I sat with hopes (maybe not high ones) to watch Netflix’s “You People.”
It’s not often that we see our cultures represented together in buzzy movies, especially not ones set in Los Angeles, the city we love so much, and with the comedy king Eddie Murphy in the cast, and we were excited about the possibility of seeing ourselves reflected in the story of blended Black and Jewish families.
Unfortunately, at the expense of comedy greats including Murphy, Jonah Hill, Deon Cole, Elliot Gould and Julia Louis Dreyfus (with cameos by so many others!), the movie ended up being a painful reminder of how our family — made up of Mexican and Black Jews with Ashkenazi roots — so often must explain and justify our existence in Jewish and Black spaces.
The movie starts off with Jonah Hill’s character very comfortably recording his podcast about “the culture” (ostensibly, hip-hop culture?) with his Black, queer best friend, seeming to set the stage for the progressive coolness that will later allow him to date someone who is not “square” and potentially Black. Hill’s character loves rap music, sneaker culture and Roscoe’s Chicken and Waffles, and he knows not to say the full title of that song from Jay-Z and Kanye West’s “Watch The Throne” album.
Yet we find him in scenarios that time and again have him playing into uncomfortable tropes — like saying “our boy” when referring to Malcolm X — as he quickly and nervously falls into defining Black culture at its most reductionist form. It’s no surprise then, that the film goes on to portray Blackness as a monolithic, one-dimensional stereotype.
It doesn’t get any better when we see Hill’s character in a Jewish space: High Holiday services at the Skirball Cultural Center, here serving as a synagogue. There and throughout the movie, Jews are portrayed as white and uncool — sometimes aggressively so, almost as if the writers didn’t trust the audience to know this family is Jewish if not for the mom complaining about tattoos and trying to set up her son with a highly educated daughter of a friend.
My husband and I have been to the Skirball Center on many occasions, one of them being a wedding for two supremely cool Jews of color. But you would never know from the movie that such an event could ever take place, or even that Jews of color exist in Los Angeles — even though, ironically, the actor playing Jonah Hill’s eventual love interest is Black and identifies as half-Jewish. Instead, in creating the world for “You People,” the writers continue a dated tradition of movies that overly simplify the worlds they depict based on racial binaries.
This flattened view of the world is especially lamentable because the rom-com genre has at its fingertips the easiest blueprint: All families are ridiculous and oftentimes the blending of two families even more so. Within my family alone, there are several different cultures that consistently push against each other in humorous ways. There’s “nerd culture,” “comic book culture,” “skate culture,” “food culture.” Even in my culturally blended family, where my Mexican immigrant parents regularly share meals with my Black mother-in-law, the resulting humor has never been about racial differences. In a story where the message is that we can all get along, we don’t need the punchline to be about race.
The Silversteins, from left: Joshua, Ami, Laila, Shel and Cinthya, outside of their Los Angeles home in 2021. (Casey Durkin/NBC)
“You People” could have told a story in which Jonah Hill’s character actually subverts the standard narrative, maybe one in which his character realizes how easy it is to fetishize Blackness and through experiences with his father-in-law comes to find the richness and fullness of Black culture that can even be expanded by his own Jewish background when blending his family with his fiancée’s. Or a movie in which a member of the Nation of Islam tries to openly accept a Jewish son-in-law and, rather than using Louis Farrakhan as an awkwardly divisive plot point, we see instead a Muslim Eddie Murphy try to find ways to connect with modern day hip-hop culture. Either option would allow the audience to see the layers in these characters that we are so often erased from narratives about Jewishness or Blackness.
Instead the writers opted for the easiest avenue: comedy based on persistent racial “othering.” But the differences shown are no longer based on any actual truth. They are based on beliefs we have been told to keep repeating in an effort to keep the agenda of white supremacy intact. The writers are depicting worn-out “differences” that don’t represent an authentic Jewish or authentic Black experience. Presenting any cultural experience as the “authentic” one is just another way of saying stereotypes are true — and that’s not funny at all.
Several years ago, my family participated in Ava Duvernay’s life-swap show in which we traded homes and experiences with a family of white Mormons. Our goal at the time was to show examples of coexistence and to demonstrate how contemporary identities are multilayered. But we also hoped that the experience would help us find greater acceptance as Jews of color, which still feels generally elusive. “You People” underscored for us why.
At one point during the life-swap, my husband said to me, “Listen, when you’re Black and Jewish, and everything hurts, laughter is the best medicine.” But laughter doesn’t come easily when the jokes only make sense if you don’t exist.
Sure, there were a few chuckles in my house during “You People.” The comedian Mike Epps was funny as he always is, and I laughed when Jonah Hill showed up to his date in a tie-dye sweatsuit, in a very L.A. move. But for nearly two hours, all I could think about was how “You People” feels like a movie for folks who are clinging to stereotypes because it helps them feel comfortable with their own cultural identities, which once were dominant but now must share real estate with others that are equally authentic. By confining the definition of culture to a singular idea of “race” this movie prevents an important conversation from moving forward. And that means my family, and so many other Jewish families, are once again left behind.
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JD Vance praises Tucker Carlson-Mike Huckabee interview as ‘a really good conversation’
(JTA) — Vice President JD Vance has weighed in on the Tucker Carlson-Mike Huckabee interview that has ignited widespread antisemitism allegations as well as a diplomatic row with Arab states, calling it “a really good conversation that’s going to be necessary for the right.”
Vance made the comments to the Washington Post, which published them Friday morning. He said he had not seen the entire interview, which was more than two hours long, but had viewed “clips here and there.”
Vance is a longtime ally of Carlson, a leading far-right figure who has stirred a rift among conservatives by platforming antisemites, at times promoting antisemitic conspiracy theories himself and increasingly campaigning against Israel. (Carlson says he is not antisemitic.)
Vance’s refusal to criticize Carlson or seek to end the rift has increasingly alarmed Jewish conservatives. To the Washington Post, he reiterated what he said before when asked about Carlson and the antisemitism rift — that he believes the Republican Party should be an open marketplace of ideas.
He said he was pleased that the right has stoked “a real exchange of ideas,” even when it includes “the people that I find annoying on our side,” whom he did not specify. That exchange, he said, was also essential for electoral success.
“If you think of the Trump coalition in 2024 — and the way that I put it is, you had Joe Rogan, Mark Levin, Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson and JD Vance and a coalition of people — but to do that, you have to be willing to tolerate debate and disagreement,” Vance said. “And I just think that it’s a good thing.”
Vance is seen as likely to run for president in 2028.
The post JD Vance praises Tucker Carlson-Mike Huckabee interview as ‘a really good conversation’ appeared first on The Forward.
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Amid Iran tensions, Huckabee tells US embassy staff in Israel they should leave ‘TODAY’ if they wish
(JTA) — Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee has told U.S. government employees and their families that they may leave the country and should do so expediently, amid mounting signs of a possible U.S. attack on Iran.
Huckabee emailed embassy staff on Friday morning saying that if they want to leave, they should do so “TODAY,” according to a letter first reported by The New York Times. He noted that commercial flights could become scarce and urged them to accept passage to any country before returning to Washington, D.C.
“There is no need to panic, but for those desiring to leave, it’s important to make plans to depart sooner rather than later,” he wrote.
The letter comes a day after U.S.-Iran talks in Geneva ended without public breakthroughs. Iranian officials, as well as the Omani mediators, said additional conversations were planned for next week; the United States did not comment. Steve Witkoff and Jared Kusher, two Jewish advisors to President Donald Trump who successfully brokered a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war last year, are leading the U.S. delegation.
Trump has been threatening to attack Iran for weeks over its nuclear program and has built up U.S. military forces in the Middle East to levels not seen in decades. In recent days, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vice President JD Vance have both said military intervention could be needed while saying the president continued to prefer diplomacy.
Vance’s comments were particularly notable because he typically opposes U.S. intervention overseas. He told the Washington Post in comments published Friday morning that there was “no chance” that the United States would get involved in an extended Middle East campaign.
Iran has said it would consider Israel a valid target in the event of a U.S. attack. Last year, Iranian missiles killed more than two dozen people in Israel during a 12-day war initiated by Israeli strikes on Iran’s military program. Now, Israelis have been living in limbo for weeks while waiting to learn whether a new war, expected to be more destructive, will begin.
In the past, when expecting Iranian retaliation, the embassy has warned staff against leaving population centers in Israel. Now, the Department of State has updated its Jerusalem embassy website to reflect “the authorized departure of non-emergency U.S. government personnel and family members of U.S. government personnel to leave Israel,” setting a status that means flights will be paid for by the U.S. government.
While El Al, Israel’s national carrier, does not fly during Shabbat, other airlines typically do run some flights to and from Ben Gurion Airport on Friday nights and Saturdays. Many of those are budget European airlines that have only recently resumed flying to Israel after last year’s Iran war; some airlines, including KLM, have already suspended Israel flights in anticipation of another conflict.
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Pro-Palestinian activist Nerdeen Kiswani sues Betar USA, alleging far-right Zionist group violated her civil rights
(JTA) — The founder of radical pro-Palestinian group Within Our Lifetime has sued the right-wing militant Zionist group Betar USA, alleging that it violated her civil rights by putting out social media “bounties” on her and harassing her with beepers.
Nerdeen Kiswani announced she had filed the lawsuit Wednesday evening, She accused the revamped historic Revisionist Zionist group of violating the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871, which makes conspiring against an ethnic minority a federal crime.
The lawsuit comes more than a month after Betar USA agreed to cease its operations in New York following a settlement with the state’s attorney general — which Kiswani’s lawsuit notes. The office of AG Letitia James found that Betar USA had engaged in a “campaign of violence, harassment, and intimidation against Arab, Muslim, and Jewish New Yorkers.”
“For years, Betar USA stalked & harassed me even offering $1,800 for someone to hand me a beeper while I was pregnant,” Kiswani wrote on X. “Last month, the NY AG found they engaged in bias-motivated harassment and threats. Still they faced no real consequences. So I’m filing a lawsuit.” She included a crowdfunding link for the suit, which has raised $4,000 in the first 16 hours.
In a statement, Betar USA called Kiswani a “terror supporter” and called the suit “an attack on Zionism itself” that “represents a serious danger to American and diaspora Jewry.” In a follow-up post on X, the group also said it welcomed a deposition against Kiswani and Within Our Lifetime, adding, “Let’s see where the money is coming from and how much you’ve cost NYC.”
Kiswani, an ethnic Palestinian born in Jordan who came to the United States as a refugee at 1 year old, has sparked outrage and accusations of antisemitism in New York and beyond with her pro-Palestinian activism and aggressive attitude toward Zionists.
“We don’t want zionists in Palestine, NYC, our schools, on the train, ANYWHERE,” she tweeted after a man was arrested for allegedly calling to eject Zionists from a subway car.
Within Our Lifetime originated as a branch of Students for Justice in Palestine before splintering off from the national group, accusing SJP of being insufficiently radical. Since then, Kiswani’s group has protested at exhibits honoring the victims of the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks; university Hillels; synagogues holding Israel real-estate events; and gatherings where speakers have praised Hamas and/or where Jews have been assaulted.
Kiswani’s prominence and activities within the pro-Palestinian movement have led to clashes with many ardent pro-Israel activists. In recent weeks a tweet of hers also prompted far-right Jewish pro-Israel Rep. Randy Fine, of Florida, to make disparaging remarks about Muslims that have led to rising Democratic calls for his censure.
But it’s Betar USA, whose members engage in similarly radical activity on the pro-Israel side, that is now facing a direct lawsuit from Kiswani. Her attorneys said Betar and its leadership, including founder Ronn Torossian and former executive director Ross Glick, had “conspired” against her “by subjecting her to a coordinated and sustained campaign of racial violence, and interference with her rights to use public accommodations to intrastate travel.”
Kiswani’s suit hones in on several of Betar USA’s common rhetoric, including the group’s use of beepers as a meme, a reference to Israel’s 2024 pager operation against Hezbollah militants in Lebanon. The suit also says Betar members “privately and publicly agreed to track Ms. Kiswani’s whereabouts, follow her, and threaten, intimidate, and attempt to assault her.”
In tweets directed at Kiswani that are still visible, Betar USA threatened to “denaturalize” the activist (after she criticized New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s condemnation of pro-Hamas chants at protests) and wrote, “We will send many more of you to meet Allah” (in reference to Kiswani calling for “the abolition of Israel by any means necessary”).
Responding to the lawsuit, Betar USA spokesperson Jonathan Levy called the group “a mainstream Zionist movement that has played a central role in Jewish and Israeli history.” Betar traces its lineage back to Ze’ev Jabotinsky, the pre-state Revisionist Zionist revolutionary, and has insisted its actions are in line with mainstream Zionist and Israeli viewpoints.
Levy added, “Calling Betar a terror group akin to the KKK is the same accusations we’ve heard calling the IDF a criminal army and labeling Zionism as genocide.”
Glick did not mention the suit when speaking to a Jewish Telegraphic Agency reporter at a different New York protest Wednesday evening before Kiswani’s lawsuit went public. He disparaged the AG’s settlement as “a lot of lies,” adding, “My position and Betar’s position is, look, we were reborn for self-defensive reasons, we weren’t on the offense.”
The Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871 was also successfully used, by a group of progressive Jewish attorneys, to prosecute the neo-Nazi marchers in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017. That case’s legal victory earned broad praise for finding a creative way to hold hateful actions to account without violating First Amendment rights.
Joseph Strauss contributed reporting.
The post Pro-Palestinian activist Nerdeen Kiswani sues Betar USA, alleging far-right Zionist group violated her civil rights appeared first on The Forward.